Fredrick C. Harris is Professor of Political Science and Director of Columbia University's Center on African-American Politics and Society.

His research interests include American Politics with a focus on political participation, social movements, religion and politics, political development, and African-American politics. Publications include Something Within: Religion in African-American Political Activism (Oxford University Press, 1999), which was awarded the V.O. Key Award for the Best Book on Southern Politics by the Southern Political Science Association, the Distinguished Book Award by the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, and the Best Book Award by the National Conference of Black Political Scientists.  He is also the co-author of Countervailing Forces in African-American Civic Activism, 1973-1994 with Valeria Sinclair-Chapman and Brian McKenzie (Cambridge University Press, 2006), which received the 2006 W.E.B. DuBois Book Award from the National Conference of Black Political Scientists and the 2007 Ralph Bunche Award from the American Political Science Association for the best book on ethnic and cultural pluralism.

Recently published articles include "The Macro Dynamics of Black Political Participation in the Post-Civil Rights Era" with Valeria Sinclair-Chapman and Brian McKenzie in the Journal of Politics and "It Takes a Tragedy to Arouse Them: Collective Memory and Collective Action during the Civil Rights Movement" in Social Movement Studies: Journal of Social, Cultural, and Political Protest. This article received the Mary Parker Follet Award for best article by the American Political Science Association's section on Politics and History.  He is co-editor with Cathy Cohen of the Oxford University Press book series "Transgressing Boundaries: Studies in Black Politics and Black Communities" and is the co-principal investigator of a major pre-election race relations poll with the ABC News Polling Unit.  He has been a commentator for a variety of media outlets, including Good Morning America  and National Public Radio.

Professor Harris's current book project is on the implications of the Obama candidacy for black politics, which is tentatively titled The Price of the Ticket: Barack Obama and the Rise and Fall of Black Politics.  Professor Harris received the B.A. from the University of Georgia and the Ph.D. from Northwestern University.  Professor Harris has been a Visiting Scholar at the Russell Sage Foundation and a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C.